I hope none of these Teabaggers have children over 18 on their insurance. They just might find out that they are hypocrites. And I said might mind you.

tps were there...must have been more speakers than audience.

they are going to "urge" the SCOTUS to repeal it? It isn't unconstitutional.
From most of the accounts I've been reading ( and I've been reading quite a bit) it should be upheld hopefully with Kennedy AND Roberts voting for it because the legacy of his court depends on it. Chief Justice Roberts will go down in history either leading a bipartisan court or a very biased one....



The ball is in your court Mr. Roberts....

http://reasonrally.org/


[div class=excerpt style=background:#AFEEEE]The Reason Rally is an event sponsored by many of the country’s largest and most influential secular organizations. It will be free to attend and will take place in Washington, D.C. on March 24th, 2012 from 10:00AM – 6:00PM at the National Mall. There will be music, comedy, speakers, and so much more. We hope you can join us! Please poke around this site for more information, stay tuned for frequent updates, and let us know if you have any questions! Speakers include:

Dr. Richard Dawkins

Eddie Izzard

Paul Provenza

Adam Savage

Rep. Pete Stark

Sen. Tom Harkin

Nate Phelps (yes, of the Phelps idiots)

Bill Maher




The list is selective, as they had a brief bio with every name.

They've all had plenty of time to read about "ObamaCare" and still none of them have a clue what it is.

How is it okay for the gov't to mandate free citizens purchase insurance?
How does requiring me, personally, to purchase gov't required insurance serve to cover anyone else?

for obvious reasons.

As for your second question, insurance premiums pay benefits for others all the time. For example, I pay about $8000 per year to cover my family, and we don't get $8000 worth of benefits in a typical year. Our premiums help pay benefits for others insured by our insurance company (as well as salaries and overhead for the ins. company).

Do you support Medicare for all? That would do away with gov't required insurance, after all.

some of us actually feel we have a moral obligation to other humans not to let them die on the street. I know, YMMV.

To answer your questions specifically -

We require many things in this society in the interest of public safety - driver's licenses, vaccinations, paying taxes to fund common public services, public education, etc... If everyone is mandated to buy in, or perhaps pay a fee for not buying in, we are more likely to be able to help folks before they get to the ER stage - which is very expensive and encourages folks to wait until their issues are more costly to address (as opposed to routine preventative care).

Personally I would rather not live in a "everybody for themselves society", but then I'm a democrat.

Here's a quote from the TOS of the website if you missed them during your sign-up: Don't be a wingnut (right-wing or extreme-fringe).

Democratic Underground is an online community for politically liberal people who understand the importance of working within the system to elect more Democrats and fewer Republicans to all levels of political office. Teabaggers, Neo-cons, Dittoheads, Paulites, Freepers, Birthers, and right-wingers in general are not welcome here. Neither are certain extreme-fringe left-wingers, including advocates of violent political/social change, hard-line communists, terrorist-apologists, America-haters, kooks, crackpots, LaRouchies, and the like.

Read the entire TOS here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=termsofservice

Excellent response!

I see the poster has not replied...could it be that s/he really wasn't interested in a dialog?

Chickenshit.

which is to be expected if your only source of news is FAUX entertainment. And sometimes folks are disingenuous so I tried to address either/or.

and I'm probably too cynical.

You rock!

one or the other!

Well you kinda need to talk to conservatives about this crazy mandate thing. It was always a conservative idea that liberals and progressives don't like. Back in '08 Sen. Obama ran on doing reform without a mandate while Sen. Clinton was claiming that a mandate had to be included.

We are now in a situation where the Commerce Clause is being used to extend power over anything that might possibly effect any interstate commerce. It is kinda crazy but conservatives love the idea of a powerful executive branch so this is where it leads us.

Requiring you to purchase health insurance helps build the risk pool for the insurance companies and therefor helps keep rates down. The more customers they have the cheaper it should be for each individual.

Right now if you can't afford medical care, we all pay for it. Somebody has to pay for the treatment and usually it's with higher cost of medical care.

The insurance companies can deny you coverage for any reason they feel like. Even if you have coverage, they can deny paying for your treatment. They also will only pay up to a certain amount. That ends with Obamacare.

With Obamacare, they have to cover you even if you have a preexiting condition. In order to make if fair and prevent people from buying insurance after they get sick, everybody has to either buy insurance or pay extra taxes for your healthcare. Obamacare gives you the freedom to buy insurance.

The ACA (Obamacare) creates a new tax. Potentially, everyone would pay this tax. The purpose of the tax is to provide funds to pay for those who get sick and have no insurance.

Those uninsured people exist today, but their burden on the medical system (and the associated costs) get passed on to those with insurance. This tax creates the funds to deal with the COST of the uninsured.

Importantly, you can AVOID paying this tax, by simply purchasing medical insurance.

Some will use car insurance as an analogy, but that's not a useful comparison.

A better comparison is the home mortgage dedication. By purchasing a home and getting a mortgage, I get a tax break. The government does not require me to buy a home. But they give me a tax incentive to do so.

And that's basically what the ACA does. I can reduce my tax burden, by purchasing medical insurance ... which is something I already do.

Now, you have a choice .... you can (a) not buy insurance and pay the tax, OR, you can purchase insurance (something you probably already do) and avoid the tax.

Importantly, either way, funds are generated to cover the coats of the uninsured, who aren't going away.

Oh ... if you can't afford it, you'll get a waiver.

And this is why the tea party nuts claim Obama = Hitler.

One last thing ... if you want to be free to pick and choose where your tax dollars go, I'll agree with you the minute I get a refund for those tax dollars that I paid that went to pay for the Iraq war. If I don't get to choose, why should you get to choose?

There, they are required to treat you, whether or not you can pay.

And if you cannot pay, the rest of us are the ones who will carry the cost of your bills.

Also, if you do not have insurance, you are less likely to be up to date on your vaccinations and check-ups, which puts the rest of us at risk for being infected by some disease you may be spreading.

Or if you have an undiagnosed heart or brain condition and pass-out behind the wheel of the car, and cause harm to others, because you didn't get the medical tests you needed.

pick up the phone now,...

Gloom and doom

Elena Kagan will personally see to it that it gets by the Supreme Court, because she's the only one with a vote, I guess.

today was the first time I'd seen - on ID channel.

He had a sign with "Obamacare" I just shook my head and thought maybe we should take away his medicare....he was that old.

a lot of folks who grew up watching the nightly news think that they are watching the truth. They don't realize FAUX is entertainment at best. It's very disheartening to watch the teabaggers protest against policies (such as universal healthcare) that could really help them.